April 22, 2020 10:00am by David Farrar

Should NZ do cash payouts?

New Zealanders should each be given a payment of $1500 to stimulate the economy, Kiwibank chief economist Jarrod Kerr says.
“Everything we have talked about to date is about keeping businesses up and running,” Kerr said. “Assisting individuals who have been directly impacted… that’s what we should have been doing. But there comes a time when we move to level two and then to level one and at that point we need to move from saving the economy to stimulating it.”
He said New Zealand would re-enter a new world after the lockdown. One way to put a “Firestarter” under the economy was to direct more money back into New Zealanders’ hands.
That could be done with tax breaks – getting rid of GST for a period or reducing its rate – or by giving cash to people.
Kerr said he was living in Australia in 2009 when the Government sent A$900 bonus cheques to Australians to help save the economy after the Global Financial Crisis. …
United States President Donald Trump has given every adult US$1200 ($2000) and every child US$500.
“I’d say a good $1500 per adult and $500 per child would cover a few months of bills for struggling households,” Kerr said.
That would mean a household of two adults and two children would receive $4000 and a single parent with three kids would get $3000.
“Some families will cover costs. Some will go shopping. Some will save it. It all helps.”
He said New Zealand was in the sort of crisis that no one had seen before. “Normally a crisis takes a lot longer to develop. We are seeing businesses shut down immediately. This is incredibly fast. We need to be incredibly quick to provide relief.”

This is definitely worth considering.

Spending $9 billion in five years times on some trains will do nothing to help the economy when it most needs it – now. If you want to soften the recession, you need to do something that has immediate impact.

So how much would it cost?

Say 1.2 million kids times $500 is $600 million.

Say 3.6 million adults times $1,500 is $5.4 billion.

So all up $6 billion.

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